Bipartisanship, education in State of the State address
The state Legislature listens to Gov. Jay Inslee give the State of the State address Tuesday.
OLYMPIA — Gov. Jay Inslee cited bipartisan efforts as a major reason for recent improvements across Washington in his State of the State address Tuesday. “We accomplished some big things last year in a bipartisan fashion,” Inslee said.
Sen. Judy Warnick, R-Moses Lake, appreciated the acknowledgment.
“I was actually pleasantly surprised on the amount of discussion he had on the bipartisan work that we have done on the last budget,” Warnick said. “I was pleased about that because we have worked hard to increase education funding, we’ve worked hard to increase the transportation funding.”
Sen. Jan Angel, R-Port Orchard, caucus vice-chair of the Senate Majority Coalition, said Republican legislators agree that through bipartisanship, the state can continue to improve.
“We will not be derailed by partisanship and the issues that divide us,” Angel said in her response to the address.
Many Republicans share the goals that Inslee laid out for this session: alleviating the statewide teacher shortage, recovering from the wildfires last year, improving mental health facilities and funding K-12 education, according to House Minority Speaker Dan Kristiansen, R-Snohomish. However, most Republicans disagree about how to obtain these goals, he added.
Sen. Mark Schoesler, R-Ritzville said he is unconvinced that more funding would address the teacher shortage.
“Even if we do put the money in, where are we going to suddenly graduate these teachers from?” Schoesler asked. “We graduate about 1,000 teachers a year between our public and private universities; that doesn’t change on a dime. Even if we did have the money, they might not be readily available.”
Kristiansen said legislators are waiting on data from studies to see where teachers are most needed.
Rep. Matt Manweller, R-Ellensburg, said he thought raising teachers’ salaries is a noble cause, but was concerned about where the funding would come from to do so.
“If you’re going to have an honest discussion, you need to have an honest discussion about what taxes you’re going to increase, or what programs you’re going to cut—and I wasn’t hearing that discussion,” Manweller said.
Inslee proposed eliminating some tax breaks to pay for an increase teachers’ salaries.
Manweller also said saving charter schools should be a top priority for this session, despite not being mentioned in the address.
For Warnick, more focus should be put on water quality and quantity in the state.
“My main goal this session is to make sure the people in Washington have adequate, clean water,” she said.
During the address, Inslee also mentioned the Clean Air Rule as a way to try and eliminate some carbon pollution.
Some Republican legislators worried that carbon taxes involved in this rule would hurt businesses and communities, particularly in rural areas. Schoesler referenced REC Silicon in Moses Lake as an example of a business that could be threatened by the rule.
Warnick said Washington has already cut emissions by 12 percent since 2000 without the kinds of penalties Inslee proposed.
To watch the State of the State address, please visit TVW’s website at http://www.tvw.org/watch/?eventID=2016010101
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